Question

What is an oxidation reaction?

Answer 1

This is the same thing as \(redox\) reaction. Are you familiar with that?

Answer 2

No, I am not.

Answer 3

I look at how oxidation rhymes with loss - adation. So oxidation reaction is the where an element or compound is oxidized or has a loss of electrons. Oxidation is the opposite of reduction.
In oxidation you start out with an element like iron , Fe. When it reacts with oxygen, the iron loses two electrons (loss of electrons) and that Fe is now an ion, Fe++.

Reduction is just the opposite, if you take the Fe++ ion and add two electrons with it, the ion becomes reduced...which means it is back to the solid metal tron, Fe, again.

So the easy way to remember is when you hear oxi---- , rhymes with loss ..of electrons.

In most oxidation reactions you start out with a solid substance, like iron, aluminum, copper, etc. and you react those metals with something that causes those metals to have a loss of electrons which make them become ions.

An ion is any element or compound that has either too many electrons or too little.